


Death of the Virgin

by Pigeon



Category: Vampire Chronicles - Anne Rice
Genre: Angst, Community: contrelamontre, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-29
Updated: 2011-08-29
Packaged: 2017-10-23 05:17:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 763
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/246667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pigeon/pseuds/Pigeon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louis and bridges and art galleries and sex and blood and death.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Death of the Virgin

_March 1897, London_

The bridge was a fake.

The stone clad gothic towers hid practical metal workings.

 _Double-leaf bascule mechanism._

 _Cantilever design._

So very _modern._

So very _now._

It was efficient, and revolutionary, and a total fraud.

Louis wandered along the high walkway. Women with rouge dabbed across their faces smiled at him, or raised skirts high enough for a glimpse of stockings to be seen. Young men, shivering in the chill spring air smirked or raised eyebrows.

A man, _little more than a boy really_ , took a long slow drag on a cigarette and sidled up close.

"For you, luv, real cheap."

Louis paused. "Oh?"

"Sure," the boy smiled. "You strike me as the _psychological_ type, very _greek_." He threw a cautious look back over his shoulder, "Like me."

"Ah," Louis inclined his head.

 _Lestat had been strangely conventional._

 _First full night as a vampire. Sweltering in the thick humidity of Louisiana and the nearby swamps. Turning down the lanterns in the master bedroom, the windows open but with lace drapes drawn across them._

 _And on the bed, beneath the covers, using whale-oil to make the going easier._

The boy walked confidently besides Louis.

He pointed out a near-by hotel.

Swore they were _discreet._

"I'm sure this will do fine," Louis murmured.

He glanced up the grey street, occasionally catching the bright tip of cigarillos flaring in doorways.

To the south, in the countryside, in still unspoilt woods bluebells would be in bloom.

And to the south, in the countryside, Oscar Wilde was in gaol and dreaming of the freedom April would bring.

Louis followed the boy into the hotel.

 _Armand had been different._

 _Second floor of the Louvre, beneath a Caravaggio that depicted the Madonna with swollen feet._

 _And the words he had whispered…_

 _So very disconcerting next to Lestat's remembered silences._

 _Words of light and dark, of the art and beauty that surrounded them, of chiaroscuro, and what Armand was going to do to him._

 _Especially that._

 _Graphic, dirty, explicit details._

The room was small and smelt of mould and cooked tomatoes.

The boy grinned and removed his slightly battered, slightly stained bowler hat.

"No need to be shy with me, luv. There's nothing I haven't seen or done."

Louis raised an eyebrow, "No doubt."

The boy stepped close, long bony fingers working at Louis' necktie.

 _It had been much the same in the galleries and museums of Italy._

 _And then, of course, beneath triptychs in centuries old basilicas._

 _And in the Vatican._

 _And in millennia old tombs in Egypt._

 _Always with the same words being spoken to him, words dropped in his ear._

 _And they had burnt._

 _A little._

 _They had burnt a little._

 _And he couldn't quite answer what was said._

The boy was tall, and he was thin, hair a muddy brown.

And his mouth was a little too full, a little too wide, a little too expressive.

Louis ran his thumb across the boy's bottom lip.

It was so close… it was almost…

No point lying to himself. No point in saying he wasn't reminded.

"Tell me what it is you're after," the boy cocked his head to the side. "What it is you want."

Louis choked back a laugh. "You would not believe me if I told you."

He kissed the side of the boy's neck, marvelling in the sheer heat there.

 _When they had first arrived in London, Armand had taken him to Cleveland Street._

 _Before they had even visited the National Gallery, or British Museum, Armand had taken him to Cleveland Street and the brothel there._

 _And he had been shocked._

 _Though he'd hidden it well._

 _Or at least tried to._

 _Shocked, not by the simple decadence and debauchery, that was nothing new, but that Armand would bring him to such a place, and watch, and encourage, and _whisper__

 _And he'd known no such thing as this would have ever happened with Lestat._

 _Lestat, who was jealous, and protective, and possessive._

 _Lestat, who had ripped out throats of those who merely smiled at him._

 _But Armand had put coins in hands, and chosen gilded youths, and directed, and said that he wanted to see Louis in this setting of soiled beauty._

 _He'd seen Louis beneath the old masterpieces._

 _Now he wanted to see him here._

Louis slid his fangs into the boy's throat, holding him tight, crushing him.

The blood rushed into his mouth.

His head felt dizzy.

He dropped the corpse.

Out the window, above the dark, dirty waters of The Thames, he could see the lying gothic façade of Tower Bridge.


End file.
